Dozens of women posed topless to express support for the mural and its message.

"The bodies of women are used to sell products, to sell cars, to sell clothes, to sell all sorts of things, but at the same time, truthfully, we are not considered the owners of our own bodies," Marelis Pagán, of the Matria (or Motherland) project, told the station in Spanish. "The fact that they have been vandalized in such a hypocritical and prudish way, covering up the breasts and the pelvis, moved us to protest as an act to take back the right to our own bodies."

The Paz Para La Mujer (Peace for Women) organization helped create the mural about a year ago. On Wednesday, members of the group wrote in a Facebook post that while street artists can always expect vandalism, the act "hurts more than expected." But they said that whoever covered up the naked bodies actually helped activists in their effort to expose the issue of violence against women.

"The people who vandalized us have done us a favor with the media, carrying our message and awakening activism," the group wrote in Spanish on its page, where it posted several photos of the mural's creation.